FREE Polar Animals Coloring Pages

Mavi is into coloring these days and I would like share the coloring pages (with trace and draw) I made for him so you too can enjoy it!

Download you copy by clicking here. Enjoy!

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Arctic and Antarctica Activities for 2 Years Old

Vito is 26 months old.

Few days ago I shared Mavi’s activities for this month.  Now it’s time I share Vito’s. 

1.  Counting activity using Penguin cards and water bottle lids.  When I introduced this, Vito was more interested in rolling the bottle lids than counting. He identifies the number in he lid then would roll it around the house.  Yes, tiring for Mommy!

2.  Matching activity for visual discrimination using our polar animal cards from here.  Vito loves matching but I would only give him a maximum of 6 cards to match everytime we do this. 

3.  Counting penguins using the Hape Puzzle Numbers and Safari Toob Penguins.  Vito enjoys counting the penguins!

4.  Gluing black and white circles in a paper for fine motor skills.  I made him use the gluing stick this time so he’ll know how to use it (I did the same thing with Mavi).

5.  Montessori parts of a penguin puzzle. I got this from a local store, but you can also purchase this Montessori material from Tower High Learning (UK) or Leader Joy USA (US) or in Amazon.  Vito loooves working with puzzles, this is one of his favourites!  He knows where to place the pieces but finds it hard to fit them all together as of the moment.   

6.  Matching Safari Toob Arctic figures to matching cards.  Will share the cards once I fix the file.

7.  Filling the buckets with blue colored rice. I made him use a scoop instead of a spoon, but he prefers using his hands. But of course, it’s the perfect tool for sensorial activity!

8. Painting using black and white Giotto Bebe fingerpaints.  I am introducing black and white this month, the predominant colors in the Polar Regions.  I also used our Polar Regions Invitation to Play tray for introducing the said colors.

It was also a great way to practice color matching, by matching the lids to the paint bottles.

9. Scooping dark brown (almost black) and white pompoms.  Another activity for hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills.

These are Vito;s activities for the entire month of January PLUS the reading of books (daily), and letter activities for literacy (we’re working on P and W this month). Watch out for Vito’s activities for the month of February. Till next time, thank you!

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FREE Letter Picture Booklet (RAMFBITG)

I have been preparing materials for Vito for next year’s activities and one of which are materials for our early reading program.  I taught Mavi how to read at the age of 3 years old without any fancy or expensive program, but with just the philosophies of Montessori and that’s what I’m going to do with Vito as well.  The object baskets that I posted earlier is part of this as well.

Now in addition to the baskets, I made these picture booklets last summer to go along with our early reading program.  This idea was from My Montessori Journey, one of my favourite Montessori blogs.  Based on her training, the alphabet is grouped into three: ramfbitg, cusnpolh and dexqyzvwjk.  The philosophy behind this is that, you can form words using the letters from each group and the child can practice reading the words once he or she has mastered the letter sounds.  You can skim through her blog to know more about this.  I also borrowed her idea of color coding the groups.  Red for ramfbitg, yellow for cusnpolh and blue for dexqzvwjk.

This is what my booklet looks like during the time of Mavi.  With Mavi, after I introduce a letter using the object baskets I would also read the picture booklet I made for him. When I read it, I emphasize the beginning sound like ‘mmmmm’ milk.

Vito’s version of letter picture booklet is more fancy because of the availability of materials now LOL  

Because I love my readers, I am sharing these booklets for FREE!! You can download my FIRST SET OF LETTER PICTURE BOOKLET and create your little books according to your liking.  Each letter booklet contains 6 pictures that represents the beginning letter sounds.  Here’s how I assembled the booklets.  The first set contains RAMFBITG letters.

Some important notes though.  I just prepare this ahead of time, but I will never push Vito if he’s not interested.  Mavi was obsessed with letters at the age of 2 years old and always keeps asking for “more” when it comes to literacy-related activities thus he started learning how to read at an early age.  Always keep in mind that the child’s interest vary. Vito loves pointing at things and naming them, thus I know he will enjoy these booklets.  If your child is not interested just keep the booklet away and do activities that he enjoys. 

Don’t forget to check my object baskets too!  Hope you enjoy this and watch out for the second batch as well. Enjoy!

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Practical Life Activities @ 24 Months and {Learn & Play Link Up}

Vito turned 2 years old last month.  Aside from the letter t sound and tree themed activities, here are the practical life activities Vito worked on:

1. Do-a-dot marking.  I prefer drawing the circles instead of printing those which are available in the web to save ink.  Vito loves this activity.  He enjoys stamping the circles with the markers. This is also a good shape activity because it allows the child to identify the shape in the paper before stamping it. Which reminds me that that next time we’ll do this, I’ll use squares or triangle instead of circles. 
2. Pouring rice.  I’m using two small jugs and a colored rice.  We’ve done this before using water, this time I changed the medium. 
3. Stringing.  This is just a portion of Melissa & Dough beads which I got earlier this year.  I attached a wooden skillet in the string so he can easily insert the beads. 
4. 2 Piece Farm Puzzle.  At first I gave him 3 sets to work on, and then added as he progresses.  He also loves this activity and would work on it in the afternoon.  This is a good introduction to part-and whole concept.
5. Stickers in a line.  This is a directed sticking activity wherein Vito has to place the stickers in the lines.  He’s good at it!
6. Scissor and playdough.  I made Vito use this plastic scissor whenever he plays the playdough so he’ll get used to it. Playdoughs are soft and can easily be cut, unlike paper which needs a sharper scissor so I think that this is a perfect material to cut for little ones.
7. Tweezers.  We have a lot of tongs and tweezers but I have to purchase this plastic tweezer because Vito was having a hard time using the ones that we have.  This new tweezer is just perfect! It is soft, and can be easily manipulated by Vito.  It has teeth on its end so it can easily grip the object.  Vito loves using this.  But note, the end is pointy so adult supervision is a must even if this is made of plastic.
8. Water transfer using sponge. “squeeze squeeze squeeze”, that’s Vito’s new favourite word!  he just learned that few weeks ago as he was doing this tray.  Water activity is always a favourite and Vito works on this for about 30 to 45 minutes.  Once bored with squeezing, he would automatically switch to pouring water between bowls. 
9. Glue with brush.  There’s just so many way to glue and one of my favourite is the glue with brush.  I made Vito use this and he works like an expert!  Those are paper cut-outs with letters on it (handwritten) so that we can name the letters as we glue them!

 

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Welcome to the Learn & Play Link Party!

Here are the featured Christmas-themed activities for this week!

 

 

Fine Motor Skills  Christmas Tree from Living Montessori Now

Paper Plate Christmas Tree from Creative Family Fun

Nutcracker Unit 2 w/ FREE Printable from Every Star is Different

Printable Advent Calendar from Sights and Sounds Readings

 

Now it’s time for this week’s link party! This is a BRAND new link up for all blog posts that include learn and play activities and hands-on education for kids. We are excited to read your blog posts and to see what you have to share! Please link up below and grab our button to display on your blog.

If you are a blogger, share your family friendly posts here. We are looking for things which include:

• Montessori Education
• Homeschool
• Sensory Play
• Tot and Preschool Trays
• Fine and Gross Motor Activities
• Kids in the Kitchen
• Healthy Recipes for Kids
• Arts and Crafts
• Natural Living
• Free Educational Printables
• Family-Oriented Activities
• Healthy Living

Your post will be featured on each of our blogs where we will pick our favourite posts every other week. That means there is more of a chance that you will be featured!

Everyone, please meet our link party hosts:

Christian Montessori Blog ~ Please visit our CMN FB group ~ Pinterest

Vanessa from Mama’s Happy Hive~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jennifer from Study at Home Mama~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Marie from Child Led Life~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Jae from Pinay Homeschooler~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Heather from Golden Reflections Blog~FB~Pinterest~Instagram~Twitter

Renae from Every Star is Different~FB~Pinterest

GUIDELINES FOR LINKING

• Please link up 1-3 posts
• Follow each of the hosts on social media
• When you link up, please add our button and place it at the bottom of your shared posts or link back with text link.
• By entering a link, you’re giving us permission to feature an image on our blogs. Proper credit & links will ALWAYS be given.
• Please visit a couple of shared posts and leave a comment for them
• Remember that you must link back in order to be featured

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Object Baskets for A to H

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I’ve been working hard for the past days organizing our object baskets for Vito’s phonics practice.  Vito knows his alphabet and numbers, he names half of the alphabet with their phonics sound.  Like he calls letter B as “bah”, and H as “huh”.  I guess this is the result of me teaching Vito the sound first, before the name of the letter itself. Something like “this is mmmmmmm, M” or “this is ssssssss, S”. 

What is an Object Basket

These are baskets that contain a letter along with 3 dimensional objects to match to the letter by beginning sound.  The concept behind this is similar to the object boxes of Montessori (for reading)  , but we are not going there yet.  The object baskets are simply for exploration, vocabulary and learning phonic sounds.

Assembling the Object Basket

Each of my basket has an uppercase and lowercase letter.  We are using the letters from Hape Uppercase and Lowercase puzzles and the Munchkin foam bath letters.  I wanted to add the magnetic letters from Melissa & Doug but I was thinking that there’s too much letters in basket already, so I’ll just reserve those for my future object boxes (reading). 

I wanted to add sandpaper letters but mine is a DIY years ago and its incomplete. I plant to get a set this Christmas as gift to self LOL but still waiting for the discounted price (hoping!).

Gathering objects is the most exciting part.  I would search in the kitchen, bedroom and my kids’ toys for appropriate objects to add in the basket.  Since Vito is only 2 years old, I limit the number of objects in the basket, maybe 3 – 5 only.  They don’t have that stamina and attention span for 10 objects so better keep it simple and avoid overwhelming the little ones. 

Object Baskets from A to H

So I just completed these baskets, took photos and print the set so that it’s easier for me to assemble once we start with the activity (we’ll do this after the holidays).  Will display this on top of our shelf and worked on it after we do our daily routine of reading books.

A Basket:  alligator, ambulance, A foam letter, apple, A picture booklet

B Basket:  book, banana, block, B foam letter  and B picture booklet

C Basket: cow, carrots, C foam letter,  car and C picture booklet

D Basket:  dinosaur, diaper, Duplo, DIY sandpaper letter, letter D

 

E Basket: eye (McDonalds), elephant, egg (McDonalds), DIY sandpaper letter

F Basket: feather, four, letter F, upper and lowercase F, fork, flower, fish, fence, DIY sandpaper letter

G Basket: grapes, giraffe, goggle, upper and lowercase F, F foam letter,  DIY sandpaper letter

H Basket:  upper and lowercase F, DIY sandpaper letter, horse, heart, hanger, hippo, hammer, H foam letter

Ideally, we will work for on one letter a week, but this doesn’t always happen.  So I usually schedule the next change of basket after 2 weeks.  I am still gathering up objects for my second batch.  Hopefully I can finish it soon so I can share it with you.  And that’s it for the first set of my object baskets! Stay tuned for second set from I to P

Hope you find this inspirational!

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